The National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE) in collaboration with National Association of Women’s Action in Development (NAWAD) have launched a Women-led campaign on fossils, energy and climate.

The NAPE and NAWAD are members of WoMin - an Alliance of African Women against Destructive Extractivesm. WoMin is an alliance of African Women with members from 12 countries in Africa namely: South Africa, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Nigeria, Ghana, and Burkina Faso. WoMin works to promote women’s rights in regard to natural resources extraction, with specific focus on the mining sector in Africa.

The negative impacts of extractive industry projects fall predominantly on women rather than men and are much more significant than generally recognized, including the breakdown of family relations and a significant increase in family tensions and domestic violence associated with the arrival of projects in poor communities.

As the people most affected by the extractive industry, women themselves must be at the forefront to fight for their rights. In an effort to promote women’s rights, has commissioned a women-led campaigns on fossils, energy and climate change in four countries (Nigeria, DRC, Uganda and South Africa) were the alliance has members. The alliance members will conduct national campaigns in their respective countries, and then later form an African region women-led campaign. The African Women-led Campaign is expected to influence decisions on Human Rights, Culture and Business at international level.

To kick-start the national campaign, the member groups in these countries have conducted national consultative meetings to introduce a women-led campaign to their local & grass-root networks. The Uganda national campaign is spearheaded by NAPE in collaboration with NAWAD. The two organizations conducted a national consultative meeting for rural and grassroot women from the Albertine region, Northern Uganda and Karamoja region.

The network of women in this campaign will work in solidarity to build sisterhood and with a united voice demand for participation in decision-making in the oil sector, and demand for fair treatment and equitable share in the extractive sector.